System &amp; Method of Delivering Collective Content Based Advertising

ABSTRACT

A system and method is disclosed for presenting relevant advertising to user search queries. The ads are based on content which is derived from a set of documents/pages from website forming a collective.

RELATED APPLICATION DATA

The present application is a continuation of U.S. patent applicationSer. No. 11/565,411, filed Nov. 30, 2006. That application claims thebenefit under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) of the priority date of ProvisionalApplication Ser. No. 60/741,163 filed Nov. 30, 2005, which is herebyincorporated by reference. The application is also related to thefollowing applications filed Nov. 30, 2006 and which are herebyincorporated by reference:

System & Method of Delivering Content Based Advertising—Attorney DocketNo. 2006-1;

System & Method of Evaluating Content Based Advertising—Attorney DocketNo. 2006-2;

System & Method of Delivering RSS Content Based Advertising—AttorneyDocket No. 2006-4.

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates to providing electronic advertising toonline users, and particularly to delivering relevant advertisementswhich are derived from within collective content of an associated groupof Internet based websites.

BACKGROUND

Electronic ad serving systems are well-known in the art, with perhapsthe most famous and successful (at this time) being the Google Adwordsand Adsense programs. The goal of such systems generally is to ensurethat advertising material is more closely tailored to the particularinterests/needs of online users who are performing searches and/orperusing content at various websites.

The prior art “Adwords” system used by Google allows advertisers to bidand participate in an auction for “keywords” (and in some cases semanticvariants) expected to be presented by users searching for information onthe Internet. For example, an advertiser may elect to bid $1 for theright to present ads within the Google search interface whenever asearch is performed concerning real estate in certain locales inCalifornia. These ads then appear in the search pages in a so-called“sponsored link” area to allow users to distinguish them from so-called“organic” search results. A similar system originated by Overturedescribed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,269,361 (incorporated by reference herein)operates under a similar principle and allows advertisers to compete foruser attention within a search interface.

The operation of the Adwords system, from the user perspective, isdepicted at FIG. 3 and works generally as follows: within a searchinterface 300, a user enters a search query within an entry field 310,in this instance the request is “Where can I buy real estate inBerkeley.” The query is handled in a well-known fashion to retrieve(preferably multiple) individual relevant search results 321 presentedwithin an “organic” search area 320. For more information on how searchresults are generated, please see U.S. Pat. No. 6,285,999 which isincorporated by reference herein. The search result entries 321typically include at least an identifier usable by a browser (i.e., suchas a URL) for clicking through to such site, as well as additionalinformation, such as context text excerpted from the webpage to denotethe correlation to the user query. These short extracted blurbs help theuser to gauge the relevancy of the search result before requiring theuser to click through and check the contents of the webpage.

As alluded to above, the search interface 300 also includes a SponsoredSearch Results area 330, in which ads 331 sponsored by advertisers arepresented along with the search results. The mechanism by which such adsare presented is well known and discussed at length at Google's websiteas well as in U.S. Patent Publication No. 2005/0071325 to Bem which ishereby incorporated by reference. The ads 331 typically include somedescriptive text and a URL to allow click-through. Note that in someinstances some of the sponsored link ads 331 can be blended with theorganic search results, such as by placing them at the top of area 320to increase their visibility. It will be understood by those skilled inthe art that the above is merely an illustration and in actual practicethe placement, format, etc. of the various portions of interface 300 mayvary significantly from that shown.

One limitation of the prior art Adwords scheme nonetheless is that itallows advertisers to bid on keywords which may have nothing to do infact with the user's query, or worse, may have nothing to do with theadvertiser's actual business. In other words, some of the sponsored linkads 331 are only marginally relevant to the user's query 310, but theyare presented because such advertisers have bid a significant premium tohave such listings posted in area 330. This is referred to as“over-serving” of ads and can lead to frustrating experiences by userswho click on such ads, only to find out the resulting web pages ofadvertising are not really related to their query. The effect isexacerbated because some “mask” the true nature of their sites throughthe use of advertising language which appears to mimic the searchresult. An example of this is shown in FIG. 3, where, for example, aSponsored Link in the number 3 position is in fact an ad for onlineauctioneer, an e-commerce bookstore, or some other similarly unhelpfullink. Google has attempted to remedy part of this problem through theuse of its so-called Adsbot program, which purportedly studies thelanding pages of advertisers to determine the relevance of such ads tokeywords. However the reality is that this merely affects/adjusts theranking of ads within the interface, and does not eliminate them frompresentation to the user.

In contrast to the Adwords system, the Google Adsense programpurportedly identifies, selects and presents ads on third party siteswhich are tailored to the content of a page being viewed by the user. Adescription of such system can be found in U.S. Publication No.2004/0059708 to Dean et al. which is also incorporated by referenceherein. An example of how such system works is shown generally in FIGS.4A and 4B. For example, as shown in FIG. 4A, a web page 400 for ABCRealty includes a number of conventional links 410 as well as a contentpresentation area 420, in this instance, real estate listings 421. A“content” related ad 430 selected for such page 400, for example, mayinclude an ad for a moving service. This ad is selected based on thefact that the content of page 400 (which may include other metadata notshown, and/or be based on other factors identified in Dean et al) wouldbe correlated to a topic entry for real estate for example. Sincepersons purchasing new housing typically employ moving services as well,this system significantly improves the user experience by presentingadvertising which is in fact more closely related to their particularneeds or interests.

A similar example is shown in FIG. 4B; in this instance a web page a webpage 450 for XYZ Realty includes a number of conventional links 460 aswell as one or more content presentation areas 470, 475 which in thisinstance include relevant commercial real estate news 471 and realestate listings 421. A “content” related ad 480 selected for such page450, for example, may include an ad for a lender offering Jumbo loans(i.e., over a certain dollar amount, such as $1m). This ad is selectedbased on the fact that the content of page 450 (which may include othermetadata not shown, and/or be based on other factors identified in Deanet al) would be correlated to a topic entry for “commercial” real estatefor example, which would typically require a significant loan in thislocale. Again it will be understood by those skilled in the art that theabove is merely an illustration and in actual practice the placement,format, etc. of the various portions of interfaces 400, 450 may varysignificantly from that shown.

As can be seen above, the Google Adsense program is superior from arelevancy perspective over Adwords, but, to the applicant's knowledge,the techniques in the former therein have not been extended to theactual Google initial search page itself. In other words, to date,Applicant's review of the prior art reveals that prior art search pagesdo not consider the content of the retrieved links/web pages inpresenting advertising within the search page, at least as explainedherein. Such extension, as noted below, materially benefits users,advertisers and search engine operators by presenting more relevant anduseful ads at the earliest point of contact with the user. In addition,this approach can have the benefit of ameliorating “under-serving” ofads in situations where advertisers have not properly appreciated thevalue of certain keywords which nonetheless may be prevalent in bothuser queries and content relevant websites.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

An object of the present invention, therefore, is to overcome theaforementioned limitations of the prior art;

Another object is to provide a system/method for providing onlineadvertising within a search page which considers the content ofretrieved results as a factor in selecting appropriate ad materials;

Another object is to provide a system/method for providing onlineadvertising within a search page using a blend of keyword targeting andretrieved content as factors in selecting appropriate ad materials;

Yet another object is to provide a system/method for assisting web siteoperators in extending the reach/effect of their content so as to affectsearch engine advertising materials;

Another object is to provide a system/method for assisting ad deliveryoperators to reduce over-serving and under-serving of ads by searchengine operators;

A further object is to provide a system/method for assisting ad deliveryoperators to identify, evaluate and/or rate advertising performance ofcontent related ads, including for the purpose of identifying potentialpartners, advertisers, etc.

It will be understood from the Detailed Description that the inventionscan be implemented in a multitude of different embodiments. Furthermore,it will be readily appreciated by skilled artisans that such differentembodiments will likely include only one or more of the aforementionedobjects of the present inventions. Thus, the absence of one or more ofsuch characteristics in any particular embodiment should not beconstrued as limiting the scope of the present inventions. Furthermore,while the inventions are presented the context of certain exemplaryembodiments, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that thepresent teachings could be used in any application where it would bedesirable and useful to evaluate content characteristics as part ofrendering online advertising.

A first aspect of the invention concerns a method of determiningadvertising information comprising the steps of: identifying searchresults corresponding to a search query; wherein the search resultsinclude data associated with one or more electronic documents from oneor more webpages; analyzing at least a first one of the one or moreelectronic documents to identify a set of one or more topics associatedtherewith; and identifying an advertisement relevant to the at leastfirst one of the one or more electronic documents based on the set ofone or more topics.

In preferred embodiments the search query is generated automaticallybased on content and/or links of a webpage. Typically the search queryis initiated by a user within a search interface.

In RSS implementations the search query can be generated automaticallybased on content of an RSS feed.

Generally the search results are presented with the advertisement alongwith keyword ads and/or pay for placement ads within the searchinterface. The search query can be adapted for locating relevant data inweb logs (Blogs) and/or RSS feeds. For some situations a keyword basedad may also be presented based on the topics identified for the searchresult listing page(s). The advertisement is preferably displayed withina search interface.

In some implementations the performance of the advertisement and/or theunderlying web pages from the search can be measured based at least inpart on user interaction with the advertisement. For different campaignsa set of advertisements associated with a particular webpage can betested to determine a performance and/or ranking for individual ones ofthe advertisements. To determine this set of advertisements associatedwith a particular webpage are presented within a search interfacewithout the presence of other advertisements. Furthermore the set ofadvertisements associated with a particular webpage can be presented ona query-by-query basis as part of an advertising test campaign,including by considering at least one or more of: a) an identity of auser; b) a time of day; c) a duration period of the advertising testcampaign; d) user demographics; e) a topic of the query; f) otheradvertisements presented within a search interface.

Another aspect of the invention concerns a method of presentingadvertising information within an electronic interface comprising:identifying search results corresponding to a search query; wherein thesearch results include references to one or more electronic documentsfrom one or more webpages; analyzing the one or more electronicdocuments to identify a set of one or more topics associated with acollective content of a selected set of such documents; and presentingone or more advertisements within the electronic interface which is/arerelevant to the set of one or more topics.

The collective content is preferably based on a term vector computedacross the selected set of documents, but may be constituted by otherknown means.

Yet another aspect of the invention concerns a method of presentingadvertising information within an electronic interface comprising:providing search results in response to a search query within a searchwebpage; wherein the search results include references to one or moreseparate webpages, and the webpages are maintained by one or morecontent site operators; determining whether an advertising relationshipexists between an advertising system operator providing the searchresults and at least one of the one or more content site operators; andpresenting at least one first advertisement based on the advertisingrelationship within the search webpage along with the search results,which at least first one ad is based on content of at least a first oneof the one or more webpages. In this manner the search engine operatorcan selectively prefer/reward affiliates within an advertising network.This method could be extrapolated in some instances so that a secondadvertisement based on a second advertising relationship between anadvertising system operator and a second one of the content siteoperators can be presented as well.

In most applications additional keyword or pay for placement ads can bepresented within the search webpage at the same time.

Still another aspect of the invention deals with presenting advertisinginformation to an electronic interface comprising the steps: providingsearch results in response to a search query within a search webpage;wherein the search results include references to one or more separatewebpages; processing content extracted from selected ones of the one ormore separate webpages to compile a separate pseudo web page;identifying one or more topics for the pseudo web page; presenting atleast one first advertisement within the search page along with thesearch results based on the one or more topics. The pseudo page may becompiled dynamically or pre-compiled and stored for later/fasterretrieval. As before in some preferred approaches the selected ones ofthe one or more separate webpages are determined by based on an existingadvertising relationship between an advertising system operator andoperators of the separate webpages.

A further aspect of the invention concerns a method of presentingadvertising information to an electronic interface comprising:interacting with an online user within a first webpage; selecting a setof second webpages based on one more predefined criteria, and whichpredefined criteria use data derived at a time when the online user isinteracting with the first webpage; presenting advertisements to theonline user within the first webpage, which advertisements aredetermined by examining content derived from the second set of webpages.

Still another aspect concerns a method of testing advertisinginformation within an electronic interface comprising: identifying oneor more topic related advertisements; analyzing search resultscorresponding to one or more search queries to determine a firstcandidate set of individual webpages; and determining a performancerating for each of the individual webpages by examining a correlationbetween a presentation of each of the individual webpages and a userinteraction with the one or more topic related advertisements. In thisfashion an advertiser can test and evaluate the potential performance ofa set of new ads against one or more webpages.

The webpages can then be sorted based on their performance. Followups inthe form of automatic communications can be prepared and sent tooperators of selected ones of the webpages based on a ranking of theirperformance.

A related aspect of the invention concerns a method of testingadvertising information within an electronic interface comprising:identifying at least one target webpage; identifying a set of one ormore individual topic related advertisements adapted for the at leastone target webpage; and determining a performance rating for each of theindividual topic related advertisements by examining a correlationbetween a presentation of the at least one target webpage within aninterface and a user interaction with one or more of the individualtopic related advertisements.

Still another aspect relates to a method of testing advertisinginformation within an electronic interface comprising: identifying oneor more topic related advertisements; identifying one or more targetwebpages; and determining a performance rating for both the targetwebpages and the topic related advertisements by examining a correlationbetween a presentation of the one or more target webpages and a userinteraction with the one or more topic related advertisements.

A further aspect of the invention concerns a method of presentingadvertising information within an RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feedcomprising: identifying a first content in the RSS feed; generating aset of search results based on the first content; wherein the searchresults include references to one or more separate webpages; processingcontent extracted from selected ones of the one or more separatewebpages to identify one or more topics; and presenting at least onefirst advertisement in connection with the RSS feed based on the one ormore topics.

The first advertisement can be presented as part of the RSS feed and/orin a data channel outside of the RSS feed. The first advertisement canbe further based on analyzing a plurality of RSS feeds selected forpresentation within an RSS aggregator.

Another aspect of the invention relates to a system and method foridentifying appropriate electronic advertising information for a searchengine comprising: forming a website collective whose members include aplurality of different websites characterized by a common parameterincluding at least one of a common content topic and/or a commoncontractual arrangement; compiling content taken from webpages in thewebsite collective to generate a synthetic document representingaggregated content from said different websites, and identifying anadvertisement to be associated with said aggregated content by comparingcontent of said advertisement and said synthetic document.

Other aspects of the invention concern systems which are adapted withsoftware modules/routines and other related hardware for performing theaforementioned methods above.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates a search/advertising delivery interface implementedin accordance with one exemplary embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2 is a flow chart illustrating the steps performed by anadvertising selection and delivery process implemented in accordancewith one exemplary embodiment of the present invention;

FIG. 2A illustrates generally how an index of synthetic pages can beprecomputed/precompiled for a set of search queries;

FIG. 2B depicts a website Collective based index ofsynthesized/collective pages for use in a content based advertisingsystem;

FIG. 3 is a depiction of a prior art search engine interface whichdelivers ads based on keyword selection;

FIGS. 4A-4B are depictions of prior art web page interfaces whichdelivers ads based on page content;

FIG. 5 illustrates a preferred embodiment of an advertisingdelivery/evaluation system constructed in accordance with the presentinvention.

FIG. 6 illustrates a preferred embodiment of an advertising testingmethod in accordance with the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of a search engine/ad delivery interface100 employed in the present invention that is adapted for providing adsthat are based at least in part on the content of related searchresults. While the present preferred embodiment is directed to adedicated search engine service, it will be understood by those skilledin the art that it is nonetheless applicable in general to any web pagewhich includes a search feature. During an interactive session with auser over a network (such as the Internet), search engine/ad deliveryinterface 100 is generated under control of a search engine provider(such as discussed above in connection with FIGS. 3 and 4A, 4B) as aWorld Wide Web web page and presented within a client device (i.e., someform of computing system) within a browser software program. The detailsof such servers, client devices, browsers, and page codings are wellknown, and are not material to the present invention. Those skilled inthe art will appreciate that any number of combinations of such elementswill interoperate with the present invention.

Interface 100 includes a number of viewable fields presented to a userfor searching and visualizing query results and advertising information.As is apparent, like referenced figures in FIG. 1 are intended tosignify like elements already identified in FIG. 3 unless otherwisenoted. These include, in this instance four primary areas:

-   -   a first display area 110 for receiving a user query; this        information can be input by the user by any conventional I/O        device, including a keyboard, a mouse, a recognized speech        query, etc.;    -   a second display area 120 for displaying so-called “organic”        search results; these represent individual relevant search        results 121 presented based on a Pagerank algorithm or similar        well-known algorithm as noted above;    -   a third display area 130 for displaying so-called “sponsored”        search results, which, as noted above, correspond generally to        sites 131 which have bid to be included in such spot based on        designation of certain desired keywords as noted above;    -   a fourth display area 140 for displaying “organic” ad results        which are individual entries 141 generated at least in part        based on analyzing content of one or more of the organic search        results.

From the embodiment of FIG. 1, those skilled in the art will appreciatethat the present invention essentially extends the behavior of the priorart content based system (see FIG. 4A, FIG. 4B) so that the advertisingmaterials which would otherwise be seen only after a click-through andpage view of such sites is now identifiable and selectable within asearch interface 100. This allows a blend or hybrid of both keyword andcontent based ads within a single interface.

Typically, of course, search interface 100 is devoid of content, but theinvention is not restricted to such embodiments. Moreover while thepreferred embodiment is presented in the form of a dedicated searchinterface, it will be understood that search interface 100 could be partof a larger website in which such interface is a component for assistingusers locate information of interest (content) on such site, as opposedto the entire Internet. Most e-commerce operators include some form ofsearch tool, and the present invention could be used in suchenvironments as well.

In other embodiments of the invention, the location and number oforganic ads could be varied with respect to the keyword/sponsored ads,so that, for example: (a) no keyword/sponsored ads 131 are used; (b)organic ads 141 are presented and blended as part of either sponsoredsearch results area 130 or organic search results area 120; (c) thenature and number of keyword/sponsored ads 131 and organic ads 141 isbalanced and determined on a case-by-case (search by search) basis basedon demographics, the nature of the query, ad economics and incentives,relationships with third party sites which maintain a content based adcampaign with the search engine provider, etc. (d) the performance ofkeyword/pay for placement ads is compared against organic ads todetermine which/how many of each is presented. For example for sometopics keyword ads may be more “relevant” while for others organic adsmay be more suitable and desirable. Other examples will be apparent tothose skilled in the art from the teachings herein.

FIG. 2 is a flow chart illustrating the steps performed by anadvertising selection and delivery process 200 implemented in accordancewith a preferred embodiment of the present invention. In a first step205, a conventional search query is received and processed, which may bedirected to general Internet documents, selected website pages, RSSfeeds, Blogs, etc. Organic search results are generated at step 210 in amanner as noted above (such as by PageRank or some other comparablealgorithm). As indicated at step 215, the formulation of organic searchresults may be based on other user-specific factors, such aspersonalized data. The latter may include for example user demographics,prior search behavior (by the user and other users), user bookmarks,collaborative filtering techniques, the locale associated with thesearch/user, the time of day, the freshness/age of the contents of theweb pages, and other well-known criteria. This description is notintended to be exhaustive, and other mechanisms for generating searchresults could also be employed.

At step 220, the organic search results are compiled and reviewed todetermine a preliminary organic listing set. The organic search results,as noted above, include a URL identifying a webpage. This preliminaryset is selected based on factors/criteria that can be varied as noted instep 225. For example, in a very simplified scenario, the preliminaryorganic listing set could be based solely on identifying whether thereis an ongoing commercial relationship between a search site operator ofsearch interface 100 and an entity associated with the particularwebpage. As alluded to above in the ABC Realty example, typically thisrelationship can include an advertising delivery relationship based oncontent found at the ABC Realty website pages. In one embodimenttherefore, the system would detect whether there is a preexisting“adsense” campaign associated with ABC Realty.

In the event where the system does detect such relationship, a firstoptional step 230 is then executed in which one or more “organic ads”are selected based on content of the underlying webpages retrieved instep 220. To do this, the system considers and/or predicts whichparticular ad would be served to a user in response to a click-throughand/or page view of the webpage pointed to by the URL. This can be doneeasily since an ad engine can simply draw ads from an ad serverconfigured for such website. In other words, with reference to FIG. 1,in the ABC Realty/XYZ Realty examples noted above, the preferred methodpresents/serves one or more organic ads 141 which are related and/or thesame as ads 730 and 780 respectively. Accordingly an organic ad can bean actual ad selected from a preexisting stock for such webpage based onthe actual content for such page, or a predicted ad based on a predictedcontent of such page. The stock of ads for a particular web page is inturn determined by evaluating among other things, targeting informationspecified for an ad, the topics determined to be present on the webpage, the correlation of the two, and other pertinent parametersidentified for example in U.S. Publication No. 2004/0059708 referencedherein. Again in a “content” based ad system, both the content of thewebpage and the ad itself can be evaluated for a match.

In an alternative approach, in lieu of basing the decision on a singlewebsite within the search results, the organic ad could be derived froma content based ad served on a pseudo page precomputed for one or morecollectives associated with the one or more of webpages, as explainedbelow. This technique may allow for broader advertising sharing and morecreative content correlations based on the relationship of the searchresult entries to other members of their respective collectives.

The key point in this part of the process is that the user of the searchinterface is presented with content related to the organic search resultwebsite pages without actually having to click-through to such sitesthrough the organic search results presented. Consequently at the end ofstep 230 a first set of content based ads 141 are prepared forpresentation within search interface 100 within an Organic SponsoredSearch result area 140. At step 235, as an alternative or supplementalapproach, the preferred process can also base ads in a second optionwhich are derived from a synthesized web page. The synthesized web page150 (FIG. 1) is based on the content retrieved by the organic searchresults. Again a synthesized page 150 may be drawn entirely andaggregated from web pages (or portions thereof) in which there is apreexisting commercial relationship as noted above, or could be based ona top N list of pages, etc. In contrast, in other embodiments asynthesized page 150 may only be generated under conditions in whichthere is no entry 121 for which there is a prior relationship, to avoida potential conflict with an existing business partner. Under anyconditions, a synthesized web page 150 can be derived from, among otherthings, a term vector based on the text of the combined content of theselected webpages.

Term vector information for individual and groups of webpages can bederived and/or located for example, by creating a term vector database.For instance, a database could be constructed in accordance with theteachings of an article (available online atwww9<dot>org/w9cdrom/159/159.html) entitled “The Term Vector Database:fast access to indexing terms for Web pages” by Stata et al. In suchsystem the main function in the API takes a set of page identifiers andreturns a set of vectors: tv_lookup(int n, const conn_id_t *pages,/*out*/tv_t *vectors). The function retrieves vectors for a set of URLsrather than a single one. Other similar suitable databases could beused, and search related data could be added to the synthetic page 150on a search by search basis, again, depending on the topic of the searchin a manner analogous to that discussed for step 225.

Thus, by extending the principles of Publication No. 2004/0059708 toDean et al. to consider larger aggregate collections of web pages(instead of a single web page), a pseudo web page or synthetic web page150 can be analyzed for content to determine the top M terms from thevector. An ad is then “delivered” to such synthetic page 150 withinsearch interface 100 in a well-known manner such as described in Dean,even though, as can be seen in FIG. 1, such synthetic page 150 ispreferably not displayed within such interface. The other options notedin Dean can also be employed herein, such as by analyzing the page textto determine topics, frequency of words, weighing certain keywords, etc.Alternatively, metadata can be analyzed for the synthesized page aswell. In yet another approach, the top N queries which result inreferences to the individual pages could be similarly compiled todetermine a topic for the synthesized page. Other examples in additionto those taught by Dean will be apparent to those skilled in the artfrom the present teachings. For example a collaborative filteringalgorithm or content filtering algorithm could be employed to determineother web pages which, although not appearing in organic search results120, are nonetheless likely to contain relevant and related data to theentries 121 appearing therein. This can be done by either examiningactual content for such other pages, or by examining user click-behaviorcollected during online Internet surfing sessions respectively. Thesesecondary pages, therefore, could also be considered and presented aspart of the synthetic/aggregate page 150. Link metrics for the pagescould also be used, so that selected pages which are consideredauthoritative are included as well as part of synthesizing content page150.

To save time and to expedite processing, the synthesized web page can beprecalculated in advance as shown in FIG. 2A based on studying priorsearch queries and result sets for common queries and stored in anindex. For example, a search engine site may determine that for a set oftop ranked searches {S1, S2, S3 . . . Sn} (where Sk denotes a set ofsearch terms) the corresponding set of ranked search results is {WS1,WS2, WS3 . . . WSn} where Wk denotes the top N organic search results. Aseries of N precalculated/precomputed pseudo pages or synthetic pages Pncan be generated at 224 and stored in an index 226 which can besimilarly tagged as above with corresponding organic search ads. In lieuof searches the system could also use one or more RSS feeds, Blogs,collectives of the same or other sources of content. The value of N ofcourse can be varied as desired in accordance with performancerequirements and capacity constraints.

As seen in FIG. 2B in some implementations the pseudo pages can beconstructed based on collective content from one or more affiliatedsites which can be part of an organized group, or collective. Forexample a set of separates sites (W1, W2, . . . Wm) directed to aparticular topic (or topics) may elect to be treated as a singleaggregate entity or collective 227 for purposes of deriving a pseudopage 228. Again in some instances a set of RSS feeds, Blogs or othercontent sources could be used. This may be attractive in instances wherethe web sites prefer to display only limited (or no) advertisingdirectly on their respective sites, but because of their popularity andsignificant Internet following prefer nonetheless to monetize theircontent in some capacity. These collectives can be organized and managedby the advertiser or search engine operator by topic or by profitsharing characteristics to encourage participation. In other words asearch engine operator could manage different collectives in which therecould be profit sharing for organic advertising revenues at differenttiers. Accordingly the degree of revenue sharing could be adjusted basedon the site traffic, general content, etc. The individual members of thecollective would share any such revenues based on some proportionalrepresentation/status within organic search results, their contributionof content to the pseudo-page, or any other convenient metric. Thisapproach would have the effect of allowing some sites with high traffic(but lesser content) to benefit from the content-based contribution ofother sites with lower traffic but more relevant content (from a searchengine perspective or ad serving program at least).

The collectives could similarly coordinate on the creation of pseudopages or synthetic pages to be submitted to an index of pseudo pages 229maintained by the search engine sites. The pseudo pages could be updatedby the collective or the search engine operator at regular,predetermined intervals to maintain their relevance and freshness. Bybanding together the collectives have more bargaining leverage withadvertising servers (such as search engine operators) so that they couldsecure favorable rates for members therein.

Other mechanisms for determining and precalculating the synthetic pageswill be apparent to those skilled in the art.

In the end result of step 235, a second set of one or more organic adsis determined therefore based on the aggregate content calculated forthe synthetic/aggregate search page. At step 240 these second set of adsare combined with any of the first set of ads generated during step 230to form a final set of organic ad result which will be presented withinsearch interface 100. For some embodiments the second set of organic adsmay include content-related ads which were previously determined as wellperforming. In other words, in the aforementioned conventional keywordad delivery campaigns used for sponsored search results, one factor thatis commonly used is the click-through rate to increase or decrease thelocation of an ad within sponsored search results. This means that whilea first advertiser may bid high on a particular keyword, a secondadvertiser bidding less can nonetheless secure a more prominent spotwithin the sponsored link results 140 by virtue of a higherclick-through rate. While this has been typically restricted tosponsored search results, a similar approach could be used within thepresent invention as well in connection with content related ads. Thisin turn assists a search operator to significantly improve the overallclick-through rate of ads within search interface 100 and optimizesadvertising revenue.

As an alternative, or in addition to such content based ad which isderived from organic search results, an advertisement could be presentedbased on keywords associated with one or more identified topicsdetermined for the synthetic page or pseudo page. As before, advertiserscould bid on keywords for which they want to show ads. A naturallanguage engine or other artificial intelligence classifier parses thepseudo page to map the contents to one or more predetermined topics.These topics can be actual keywords, or can be mapped to keywords asnecessary to determine a match with a particular advertiser. In thismanner an advertiser can participate in a secondary presentation ofkeyword based ads within the search interface that is determined andderived separately from a keyword based ad that is based on aconventional search query. Other examples will be apparent to thoseskilled in the art.

At step 250 any conventional “sponsored” results are then computed andadded as well to be included in search interface 100. Some embodimentsmay include a feature in which users are allowed to “opt out” ofsponsored link results 130 in favor of only organic ad results 140. Inany event the combined results (such as they are) are then displayed inresponse to the query as noted in step 260.

An additional optional step 270 is noted as well, in which a searchengine operator may in fact give a credit of some form to one or more ofthe underlying websites (or collective) which provided a webpage (orpages) used in the synthetic web page 150. In the case of an “adsense”type relationship, for example, an ad deliverer may give partial orcomplete credit to the underlying website owner (or collectiveassociated therewith) when an ad associated with such page is selected.Thus, in the example above, in the event a user selects an ad 141 forwwwdotsuremove.com, the ABC Realty site (or its associated collective)would receive credit as if the ad had been served on such site instead.In this manner the search interface in fact operates as a form of proxyfor the underlying content site(s). Again the credit could be adjustedby other factors particular to the search topic and relationship betweenwebsite and search operators. Furthermore as alluded to above, thecredit is optional and may not be awarded in some cases. Other exampleswill be apparent to those skilled in the art.

One advantage of using search interface 100 to present content ads basedon the underlying websites is that it allows for a greater impressionrate across a universe of Internet users. In other words, even aparticularly prominent and reputable site for a topic A may in fact haveonly a relatively small audience for their content. Allowing theirrelated content ads to be served within a search interface 100 allowsfor greater scaling of such entity's presence across the World Wide Web.Moreover it permits for broader and more efficient testing of theutility and performance of algorithms for content ads particular to thatsite. Balanced against this of course is the fact that such ads arecompeting against other ads within portions 130 and 140 of theInterface, and so this needs to be taken into account.

In some embodiments a search site operator could bias or skew thedistribution and selection of sponsored search results 130 and organicad results 140 at different times, or to selected users, or fordifferent topics to identify content related algorithms most suitablefor ads to be presented at different content sites. In some instancesthe users can be selected based on their identified receptiveness andrelative enhanced interactivity with online ads as calculated againsttheir peers. In the case presented in FIG. 1, for example, a search siteoperator may elect to intentionally omit sponsored search results 130 oralter the ordering of sponsored search results 130 and organic ads 140for the purpose of identifying, developing and testing optimized contentrelated ads for third party websites. Thus the identification andverification of future well-performing ads can be predicted by firstmeasuring their performance on a larger scale within a search interface100. For some embodiments an ad delivery provider can monitor theorganic search results to identify potential websites that may benefitfrom a content based ad delivery mechanism (i.e., such as AdSense). Thead delivery provider can then “test out” various content based ads todetermine and verify their performance. The results can be presented tothe third party website for purposes of demonstrating proven viability,accuracy and performance of advertising materials to solicit theirparticipation in an advertising scheme (i.e., such as Adsense) andbefore providing them with actual ads during page views of such thirdparty site.

FIG. 5 illustrates a preferred embodiment of an advertising deliverysystem 500 constructed in accordance with the present invention. It willbe appreciated that the types of systems which can embody the presentinventions can include a variety of conventional hardware platformsknown in the art, including data processing equipment and computers witha wide range of computing/storage resources and capabilities.Accordingly, the details of such software and hardware implementationsare not material except as discussed herein with reference to specificaspects of the invention, and they will vary significantly fromapplication to application based on a desired performance.

The system is generally composed of several components including aNetwork 502, through which a conventional client computing machine(and/or a browser) 501 connects to a conventional network device (suchas a server) 510. It will be understood by those skilled in the art thatother components may be connected to Network 502, and that not allconnections shown need to be active at all times. Network 502 ispreferably the Internet, but could be any implemented in any variety ofcommonly used architectures, including WAN, LAN, etc. A Networkconnection is a conventional dial-up and/or network connections, such asfrom analog/digital modems, cable modems, satellite connections, etc.,between any conventional network device and an Internet Service Providerin combination with browser software such as Netscape Navigator,Microsoft Internet Explorer or AOL. In most applications, CustomerDevice 501 will be typically desk top computers, laptop computers,personal digital assistants (PDAs), cell phones, or some form ofcomputing device suitable for providing queries and supporting thepresentation of search results and advertising in a manner shown in asearch interface 100 (FIG. 1).

Server Network Device 510 is typically one more network servers. Ofcourse, other structures and architectures may be more suitable on acase by case basis for any particular implementation of the presentinventions, and so the present inventions are not limited in thisrespect. Software elements of the present invention typically will becustom tailored for a particular application, but preferably willinclude some common features, including the following.

Operating on System Network Device 510 are the following softwareroutines and/or supporting structures, which implement a form ofsearch/advertising delivery system. First, a Search Engine module 521generates search results 523 in a manner described above in connectionwith step 210, 215 (FIG. 2). The results are derived by reference to aset of web pages maintained in a database 525.

A keyword based ad generator module 524 presents ads within thesponsored link portion 130 of interface 100, again in a conventionalmanner described above in connection with step 250 (FIG. 2). A SearchResult Content Synthesis Logic module 528 implements the proceduresnoted earlier for steps 235 (FIG. 2) to create a synthesized web pagebased on the parameters identified above. Again, as noted above in FIGS.2A and 2B, these may be precompiled and stored within an index. Theinformation used by this module includes ads derived from Web PageContent Related Ad Generator module 527 which also performs theoperations described with respect to step 230 (FIG. 2). These modulesinterface to Search Page Content Related Ad Generator 529 which includesroutines for performing the operations noted in step 240 (FIG. 2). Theinformation from all modules is then combined and presented by aninterface module 522 and in accordance with the techniques discussedabove for step 260 (FIG. 2). An accounting module 526 is responsible foradjusting and providing credits as noted above for as discussed for step270 (FIG. 2). A testing module 530 implements the operations discussedbelow in connection with FIG. 6.

It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that what is set forthherein is not the entire set of software modules that can be used, or anexhaustive list of all operations executed by such modules. It isexpected, in fact, that other features will be added by system operatorsin accordance with customer preferences and/or system performancerequirements.

Furthermore it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that aservice provider system implementing the present invention may notinclude all of the modules/databases as noted above, depending on theneeds, requirements or desires of its subscribers, and other technicallimitations. Finally, while not explicitly shown or described herein,the details of the various software routines, executable code, etc.,required to effectuate the functionality discussed above in such modulesare not material to the present invention, and may be implemented in anynumber of ways known to those skilled in the art based on the presentdescription.

The advantages of the present invention, in addition to those identifiedinclude:

-   -   A search site operator or other operator of an ad delivery        system can create and present ads even for search results that        would otherwise perhaps be devoid of sponsored links (i.e.,        based on keywords or pay for placement alone). In some cases        there is no bidding for a keyword or placement, but there may be        a content relevant, servable ad for the user query, thus        reducing underserving of ads;    -   Maximizes available real estate of the interface (particularly        in situations where there are few keyword based ads);    -   Avoids problem of presenting only ads (keyword based) which are        likely to be overserved and thus irrelevant to user queries;    -   Allows web site operators (and collectives) to (potentially)        derive additional ad related revenue even in the absence of an        actual visit to the entity's website. Thus by creating even more        useful and creative content to build up an organic rating, a        website operator and/or collective can simultaneously increase        the chances of seeing additional returns from proxied ad results        provided by a more broadly used search engine;    -   Search engine operators conversely can (potentially) piggyback        off the content of site operators to provide more relevant ads        within a search context; in this respect, therefore, a search        site is seen as imitating the behavior of a full content site;    -   Allows search engine operator to override blocking/restrictions        which may be maintained by affiliates of an advertising system.        For example, in the AdSense system, a content owner partner        (e.g., a Website/Web page publisher) can easily block entire        broad or narrow categories of ads to be presented within the        partner's website, and can specify objectionable ad content or        targeting. Concepts may be associated with a property and ads        related to those concepts may be blocked for the given property.        Further, terms may be associated with a property and ads        including any of the terms may be blocked for the given        property. This is discussed in detail in U.S. Patent Publication        No. 2005/0055271 which is incorporated by reference herein. By        using the present invention a search engine operator or ad        delivery provider can avoid the problem of presenting an ad        which is otherwise objectionable, because the third party site        is not actually seen during the user session.

Finally, the present invention can be used so that search engine/addelivery operators (i.e., such as Google, MSFT, Yahoo!) can test outcontent-related ads in advance of their submission to third parties, oras part of soliciting advertising budgets from such entities; thislatter point is illustrated in more detail in FIG. 6 which correspondsto an advertising system tester/prequalifier. As seen therein, anadvertising system operator first analyzes organic search results atstep 610 to identify websites which tend to score highly and areretrieved frequently in user queries. For each of these websites, theadvertising system operator selects a stock of ads in step 620 in amanner such as depicted in U.S. Publication No. 2004/0059708. In step630, a mock/test advertising campaign is conducted for each website, bypresenting organic ads (as noted above) related to such site withinsearch interface 100 (FIG. 1). As noted earlier, the organic ads can bepresented whenever a user query results in retrieval of organic searchresults which include the targeted webpage. The selection of theparticular stock of ads to be shown can again be targeted and varied inaccordance with a variety of known formulas otherwise applicable tocontent delivered advertising to conventional web pages as known in theart. Furthermore, in some cases the competing Sponsored Link ads can beremoved as potential “distracters” selectively on a user by user basis,query by query basis, at certain times, randomly or by some other means.This can help to isolate and better identify the true performance ofparticular ads.

Regardless of the campaign specifics, the performance (e.g., clickthrough rate, conversion rate, etc.) of one or more organic ads can thusbe determined at step 640 through rigorous submission and testing ofads. This allows an ad delivery system operator to identify and predictfuture well performing ads in advance of their submission to actualcontent site campaigns (i.e., such as Adsense). As a corollary to thisthe ad performance data can be mined to identify an appropriate futuremix of advertising suppliers for specific content sites to maximizeadvertising revenue sharing.

In the end, for example, a performance table 645 of relativeperformances by individual ads and sites can be compiled; the entriescan correspond to a scored value rated by the ad delivery operator basedon their own particular criteria. The rows and columns of table 645 canbe sorted and correlated so that the performance of ads can be rankedfor particular websites grouped within a common topic area (i.e.,medicine, law, food, electronic goods, and the like).

Conversely, in step 650, an ad delivery system operator can alsodetermine the most productive prospects from a set/class of websiteswithin a common topic area, as measured for example by click-throughrates on content related ads. The prospects can be sorted and potentialadvertising partners identified to the extent they do not already have arelationship with the ad delivery system operator.

Consequently, in the end analysis the ad delivery system operator canidentify both the best performing ads and the best performing webpages;this can be broken down, if desired, by topic. This information isextremely valuable, because any marketing and sales resources can nowtarget the more profitable candidates in both sets. Moreover this datacould be used for purposes of identifying potential groupings andmembers of site collectives which would be employed as noted above forpresenting ads based on collective content pseudo pages.

The campaign can be set to a predefined amount of time (i.e., days,weeks, etc.), for certain times of day, and/or for a certain number ofimpressions, etc. Ad campaigns are well-known in the art, so otherapproaches will be apparent to those skilled in the art.

The advantages of the above are numerous, and include the fact that addelivery system operator can now screen, evaluate and identify keywebsites, key content related ads, etc., without ever having to involvethe third party owner of a particular site. In the case of a Googlesponsored program, for example, this eliminates the inconvenience ofrequiring the third party operator to set up a separate “Adsense”campaign. Instead, the search site operator (i.e., such as Google) canset up ad campaigns automatically to run and determine profitable sitepartners and ads in advance. For example, Google already uses a searchrobot known as “Mediabot” which could be used for such scouting purpose.This spider/crawling engine is already configured to automatically checkcontent at affiliate sites for purposes of determining content basedads. Such engine could be easily modified to perform the steps notedabove of checking those particular sites which are determined to becandidate webpages for content based advertising.

This also avoids the problem of some sites being potentially hesitantabout the desirability of running ads at their site, since the test adsare not in fact presented within their respective webpages. The addelivery system operator can thus market their services to the thirdparty operator (or larger collectives as explained earlier) based on theactual analysis for a particular webpage. The ads can also be tested ona much larger scale, since page views of search engine operators (suchas Google) tend to be orders of magnitude larger than for dedicatedcontent sites.

Moreover the invention eliminates guesswork on which ads, websites andcombinations are likely to yield highest advertising revenue. Bycompleting an entire campaign on behalf of a target partner in advance,and presenting real-world data demonstrating the viability and projectedprofitability of the advertising campaign, the target webpage partner(or collective) is far more likely to adopt a content relatedadvertising system at their respective webpage.

Ad suppliers, too, can benefit in advance from knowing which ads arebetter performing with respect to certain topic related webpages. Thisknowledge of course is useful for marketing and selling ads to webpageoperators in related industries. Other benefits will be apparent tothose skilled in the art.

It will be understood by those skilled in the art that the above ismerely an example of an ad delivery system/method and that countlessvariations on the above can be implemented in accordance with thepresent teachings. A number of other conventional steps that would beincluded in a commercial application have been omitted, as well, tobetter emphasize the present teachings.

In addition, while presented in the context of a search engineinterface, the invention could be used in other environments where adscan be presented in response to content of retrieved search results.Search features are common across many e-commerce sites, includingAmazon, eBay, etc., and such sites could clearly benefit from suchtechniques. For example, in an e-commerce site, an ad related to contentof one or more retrieved items (such as books, CDs, DVDs or other goods)could be presented. In an auction application an ad could be presentedthat is related to content of auction items returned in response to asearch query. In a set top box application an ad could be related, forexample, to the content of programs retrieved in response to a searchquery. Similar examples will be apparent to those skilled in the art.

Furthermore it will be apparent that the present invention could be usedin connection with so-called “Blog” pages and RSS (Really SimpleSyndication) type Feeds/aggregators as alluded to above, or collectivesthereof. For example, Feedster (wwwdotfeedster.com) allows placement ofadvertisements in RSS Feeds. These ads are determined and customizedbased on the particular RSS feed, subscriber, etc. One embodiment of thepresent invention could include processing an RSS feed (or feeds) on apredetermined periodic basis to generate a nominal set of organic searchresults related to the particular RSS feed (or feed collective). Thesearch could be generated from a variety of means, including bydetermining one or more topics associated with the content of the feed(or feed collective) in a manner similar to that described above. Fromthese organic search results a set of content related ads could bederived in the manner described above. This set in turn could then beused as ad inserts into the RSS Feed in accordance with the prior art.

In this scenario the end viewer of ads in fact does not need to interactwith a search interface or even conduct a query per se since such isdone automatically for him/her based on the content of the feed. Somecompanies also allow “searching” of Blogs, and the present invention canclearly be used to determine appropriate content related ads byanalyzing organic “blog” page search results.

In a Blog (or even a regular webpage) application, a similar approachcould be used in which a content (and or links) of the page (orcollection of pages from a Blog collective) is analyzed to determine oneor more topics associated with the page(s). This could be performedusing a natural language classifier or any other suitable tool. Anominal organic search result list is then generated based on theidentified topic(s) of the document and the list is then mined todetermine appropriate ads. This type of approach could be used as anadjunct or supplement to any other ad serving algorithm cooperating withthe particular web page. Thus a “constructive” search is effectuatedbased on the document in question, which is then used to develop eithera content based ad (such as done with Adsense) or for which advertiserscould bid for ads based on the keywords identified by the topic for thepage in question.

The above descriptions are intended as merely illustrative embodimentsof the proposed inventions. It is understood that the protectionafforded the present invention also comprehends and extends toembodiments different from those above, but which fall within the scopeof the present claims.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method of delivering electronic advertisinginformation for a search engine implemented using computer softwareinstructions embodied in a computer usable medium executing on one ormore computing machines and comprising: forming a website collectivewith a computing system, whose members include a plurality of differentwebsites providing content for online distribution; wherein said websitecollective includes a first member presenting advertising at arespective first website; compiling content taken from webpages in thewebsite collective with the computing system, including said firstwebsite, to generate a synthetic document representing aggregatedcontent from said different websites; identifying a first advertisementto be associated with said aggregated content by comparing content ofsaid advertisement to said synthetic document with the computing system;delivering said first advertisement with the computing system withorganic search results at a second website separate from said firstwebsite; and crediting said first member in response to a user selectingsaid first advertisement.
 2. The method of claim 1, wherein said firstmember of said website collective is credited for advertising even whenit is not presented at said first website.
 3. The method of claim 1,wherein said first advertisement is presented at said second website byan advertising engine in spite of any blocking imposed by a secondmember of said website collective at a respective second site.
 4. Themethod of claim 1, wherein said website collective members are treatedas one entity by an advertising engine.
 5. A method of deliveringelectronic advertising information for a search engine implemented usingcomputer software instructions embodied in a computer usable mediumexecuting on one or more computing machines and comprising: forming awebsite collective with a computing system, whose members include aplurality of different websites providing content for onlinedistribution; wherein said website collective includes a first memberpresenting first advertising at a respective first website; identifyingsecond advertising to be presented at a second website with thecomputing system, which second advertising is based in part onidentifying whether content from said first member of said website ispresented at said second website; delivering said second advertisementwith the computing system at a second website separate from said firstwebsite; and in response to a user selecting said second advertisement,crediting said first member with the computing system as if said secondadvertisement were presented at said first website.